Deciding if storage as a service (SaaS) is right for your organization? Ellen O'Brien and Andrew Burton discuss the benefits and drawbacks of storage as a service (SaaS) today. This conversation is also available as an MP3 download below.

The major benefit is that you can offload the complexities associated with backups such as managing backup solutions from an application perspective, managing tapes, and trying to contend with offsite vaulting of tapes.

Also, some companies find that they can save money by investing in storage-as-a-service and not paying for backup tools and staffing.

Near term you won't see a big difference. But over the long term, as more and more services are established in the cloud, there will be a shift toward higher spending for storage by service providers and by enterprises.

But this will be a very gradual process. Financial services companies have been quick to adopt SaaS. Slowly but surely, other companies will get into it.

So it's not anything we're going to see overnight, but eventually there will be less need for equipment being purchased by companies and more on the service provider side.

With any kind of outsourced function you're putting more dependency and trust on external services. You also are relying on your Internet or your network service providers to make sure that your data can be transferred back and forth.

Once you go into a model like this for managed backup services, it can be complicated if you decide to move to another service provider or bring it back in house. How do you get your data back? Are you going to run into any termination clauses or fees?

Another drawback, that can be solved with good planning and due diligence, is making sure the server provider and their solution will scale with the growth of your organization.

Related information

Storage at your service Storage-as-a-service (SaaS) companies learned from the mistakes of their dot-com era predecessors. Today, SaaS is being driven by economic factors, as well as runaway data growth, compliance requirements, security issues and disaster recovery mandates. And a few well-established storage heavyweights entering the market hasn't hurt any.

Self-service storage -- do-it-yourself provisioning gains ground Self-service storage allows the storage administrator to take advantage of all the capabilities of virtualized storage and respond to user needs for storage volumes more rapidly than ever, while not being burdened with the eventual outcome of easy storage distribution or virtual volume sprawl.

Learn all about self-service storage One of the biggest burdens for storage administrators today is provisioning storage. The amount of time it takes to get storage provisioned to an application continues to grow, with wait times of 30 days and longer becoming more common. One solution to this problem, self-service storage, can make any storage admin's job much easier. This handbook will teach you what you need to know before venturing into self-service storage.

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